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[Page S2737]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
Ex-Im Bank
Mr. LANKFORD. Mr. President, we had three extremely well-qualified
people come before this body this week who were nominated to the Board
of the Ex-Im Bank, the Export-Import Bank. It is an entity that most
individuals across the country don't even know about. They don't even
know what the Ex-Im Bank does. But it gets caught up in a lot of
politics here.
These extremely well-qualified people were confirmed, and they are
now on their way to serve our Nation in that area. I had to vote
against them, not because of who they are and their qualifications--
they are clearly qualified--but because of my own frustration that this
body has not been willing to take on the most basic element of reform
of the Ex-Im Bank.
The charter of the Ex-Im Bank requires the Bank ``to seek to reach
international agreement to reduce government subsidized export
financing.'' That is in their charter. The problem is, that is not
being fulfilled. There has been a push for a while to try to reform the
Ex-Im Bank. That push to reform it has failed so far.
My encouragement to the new quorum that is in the leadership role at
the Ex-Im Bank is to push to fulfill their requirements to reduce
government-subsidized export financing, not expand it, and to take the
actions necessary to do that--not only with our Ex-Im structure but
working with other countries to reduce theirs. The common phrase is
``We have an ex-im bank because other countries have an ex-im bank.''
Well, you know what, other countries have a Communist structure--like
China. We are not trying to model that either. Should we take on every
single subsidy other governments do? Let's try to find a way for them
to fulfill their charter.
In the meantime, I have proposed a set of reforms that can be done to
the Ex-Im Bank to make it better. Some are fairly obvious.
One of them is reducing taxpayer exposure by prohibiting the Bank
from issuing direct loans.
I have also pushed very hard to have this basic statement: a sense of
the Senate that the Bank is a lender of last resort, not the first
place to go to. That, again, should be a no-brainer for them.
Here is the clearest and easiest reform. Ex-Im Bank brags about how
many small businesses use the Ex-Im Bank services, but the next
question is not asked. How does Ex-Im Bank define a small business?
With chagrin, they will say that their definition of a small business
is any business with 1,500 employees or fewer. That is not a small
business. So 1,500 employees or fewer is a small business, according to
Ex-Im Bank. There are very few companies in America with 1,500
employees.
The most basic thing we can do is have Ex-Im Bank use the same
definition the Small Business Administration uses for what a small
business is and then put the same requirement on Ex-Im to also use
small businesses and engage with them.
We should also prohibit the Bank from providing financing services to
foreign and state-owned entities. Why are we financing another
government in what they are doing? Why are we actually providing
competition for our own companies, as Ex-Im does? They give loans and
subsidies to countries and companies that compete against American
companies.
All of these ideas are basic reforms.
My push is not to abolish Ex-Im; it is for Ex-Im to fulfill its
charter and to do its basic responsibility and to have the most simple
reforms that I think are needed.
This is not just talk for us; we have this legislation. We have
pushed for this before, and we will continue to push for basic reforms
at Ex-Im in the days ahead.
With that, I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Ohio.